TRPG General Chat

The Oracle

03:16

0

SSD just closed this question as off-topic because it's about a video game. The question is about DNDBBS, which appears to stand for "Dungeons and Dragons Bulletin Board System." This site describes it as "An attempt to bring Dungeons and Dragons to the BBS Experience." That makes it sound mor...

Ben

05:49

So I just yelled "bum" in the middle of the office, cos I basically undid an hour's worth of work accidentally.

But I may as well have just sworn cos the reaction I got was pretty much the same than if I had.

trogdor

Lol

If I did that in this office I would probably get a lecture

Miniman

Almost everyone in my office swears often enough that nobody would notice. Not necessarily particularly loudly, though.

trogdor

Any swearing here gets an immediate response

Our supervisor doesn't like it

Miniman

If you were an Aussie working overseas and people complained about swearing, you could just go with "stop oppressing my culture, you ethnocentric jerks!"

trogdor

Lol

Ben

05:55

Haha yup

kviiri

08:47

Morning

Sdjz

@kviiri Hello

kviiri

08:59

How's it going?

Sdjz

@kviiri Very slowly, it's morning here too

kviiri

For all my love of sauna I'd prefer if the heat was confined there instead of not being all over the land

HenryWLee1066

09:12

Last session, my best d20 roll was a 7. I rolled a 1 & 2 with advantage one time.

Anyone have any tips on getting better dice rolls?

😩

kviiri

Make sure your d20 has all the numbers intact :>

Secespitus

2 days ago, by nitsua60

@Pixie I'm a fan of the d30. I keep one in my dicebag for when I need a good bump to my likelihood of success but want to maintain my "I always roll in the open, no shenanigans here" image intact. Roll and read it quick enough and they usually just think it's a novelty-large d20 =)

Praying may also help ;)

kviiri

As a serious recommendation though, try to find the time and energy to look into systems where there's only bad rolls for characters, not players :>

HenryWLee1066

09:28

I got some advice from some of you last week on playing a bard. It was fun hanging in the background waiting for just the right moment then dropping a major change to the battlefield. It was more satisfying than the martial I usually play. And the sleep spell didn't need a d20. ;) Thanks for the guidance.

kviiri

Sleep is really good early on

It starts to lose its oomph on later levels, but you can always retrain it.

HenryWLee1066

That's what I've heard. Could always be useful for a solo guard or something, but eventually Hyp Pattern & Wall spells will be my combat go to.

kviiri

Yeah, Sleep does gets points from me for being a decent combat and non-combat spell.

kviiri

09:46

I miss the 4e approach where combat and non-combat spells are separate picks.

trogdor

the 4e ritual system was definitely nice

HenryWLee1066

10:09

The DM we are playing with seems to be more focused on story and role-play than combat. I'm trying to decide between ritual Caster (wizard), Observant (+1 wis), or +2 cha. I'm concentrating on non save & buff spells. Any suggestions on how to think through that? Our party has a face, and I'm the utility / sneaky / controller guy.

Joel Harmon

11:31

@kviiri I think non-combat is a bit exclusive there; I like the term 'utility'.

BESW

@JoelHarmon No, it's accurate in context.

The Masked Rebel

o/

BESW

There are utility powers; they're useful in combat OR out of combat, and they follow the same rules and slots as combat-specific powers.

The Masked Rebel

Hello?

\o/

BESW

And then there are rituals, the quickest of which takes at least five minutes to cast and are designed and balanced around giving access to really cool stuff without worrying about how it messes with combat balance.

[wave]

Sdjz

11:42

@TheMaskedRebel hello

doppelgreener

Rituals are such an awesome system.

The Masked Rebel

hey everyone

What is up here

doppelgreener

... this nearby shop either served me something else instead of its chicken katsu curry, or its new way of preparing chicken katsu curry is way worse than what it was serving a couple of weeks ago.

(which is a pity because it was the best around)

(or would be)

I came across an idea someone shared about a fantasy novel which tickled me. I'm not sure how accurate it is for that novel, so I'll just share the idea in isolation:

the prime law of magic forbids using magic for murder, and you have to answer for your crimes if you break this law. However, one of the most powerful acts of magic available to a single individual is a spell that kills its target, either immediately or dooming it—but requires so much energy to cast that the wizard casting it must sacrifice their life to do it. However, this neatly dodges any chance of being taken to trial for your crime. 8)

BESW

Reminds me a little of demon magic in the Five Gods setting.

doppelgreener

What's that like? :D

@BESW By the way, I don't know if you saw already, but for the time being I have Smoke Detector posting to NAB instead of here when it detects RPG spam.

BESW

11:55

Yeah, it's starred right over there.

In Five Gods, magic is always some kind of interplay between the magic-user and a being of power.

trogdor

@doppelgreener this has happened to me a few times, not specifically with chicken Katsu curry though

doppelgreener

@BESW Oh right :D

BESW

Saints are conduits for the will of a god, but it's very difficult to open your heart and let a god reach through you into the world. Nobody ever intends to become a saint, and saints tend to grumble to each other about their gods.

trogdor

hehe

yeah that was a hilarious setting to read about

BESW

Shaman are hosts to a great-souled animal, the result of many generations of work in an art now almost completely lost.

And then there's sorcerers, who have become host to a sliver of pure chaos.

trogdor

12:00

(god of all the other stuff) "hey saint can you eat some demons for me?" (saint of that god)"ugh ok I guess,.... but only because they are all trying to kill me anyway"

BESW

Most folks call these slivers demons, and a demon has no personality of its own but develops traits and an individual identity by stealing them from its hosts--and a demon can have many hosts, because being host to a sliver of pure chaos tends to be hard on the host body.

Demons are the easiest kind of magic to get on purpose, but usually the demon winds up controlling the sorcerer rather than the other way 'round and it's not a fun life for the host.

However! Death magic is a demon specialty and is quite easy to control because, as agents of entropy, demons are very easy to convince to kill someone.... the trick being, they'll kill the ritualist as well.

trogdor

I personally didn't like how,... demons could posses someone without a bargain happening first,... and expelling them was also hard

like that seemed,... like a little too much bad stuff for something that could happen to someone randomly

a magic thing that could happen randomly anyway

BESW

Yes, well, that's part of why Demons Are Bad.

trogdor

yeah,... but something like that, with seemingly no rules,... annoys me a little

I still really liked those books though

that was probably just about the only slightly annoying thing

doppelgreener

@trogdor you realise you're complaining that slivers of chaos aren't following rules though :P

trogdor

12:05

@doppelgreener not that they aren't following rules,... that they don't have their own rules attached

doppelgreener

but that makes perfect sense to me :D

if slivers of pure chaos had rules attached, one might have to question the purity of that chaos.

trogdor

like,... magic that can devour someones soul is fine in a fantasy setting,... but when it's defualt state is "no one did anything but now you have one on you and good luck getting it off",......

@doppelgreener it's not how chaotic they are that bothers me really

it's that they also really screw over a host even if neither the host or an enemy infected them with it

and on top of that,. getting rid of them is kinda spotty

I just felt like they could have been tweaked a little is all

but just to reiterate, I actually really liked those books a lot

even the demon stuff was cool rather often

BESW

Basically, when a demon finds itself without a host, whether because it's freshly escaped from the domain of the Bastard or because its last host just died, the demon immediately leaps into a nearby living creature. There's no save, no attack roll, no possible defense beyond certain niche saintly powers, to avoid getting possessed.

trogdor

some characters actually threw in with them and deserved the stakes they got

doppelgreener

ooh, i see.

BESW

12:10

(Demons are terrified of the Bastard, who wants to get them back.)

trogdor

it's just that sometimes someone kills a bear that would have mauled them and their whole travel goup and whoops demon now

doppelgreener

on the other hand, hosts getting this thrust upon them regardless of anything they or anyone else did sounds essentially perfect for how chaos might behave though. :D

BESW

And once you're possessed, well, there's only ever at most one saint in the world with the knack to get a demon out of you without killing you.

trogdor

@doppelgreener and that's fine too, but then they still have that whole "well this is really hard to get rid of" thing too

doppelgreener

so demons are OP? :D

trogdor

12:11

sorta

some saints just eat them

BESW

So now you've got a malevolent entropy spirit co-habiting your body. If it's dumb (hasn't had a lot of hosts to learn from) you might be able to harness it for good... by dedicating your life to learning how from the Bastard's priests.

trogdor

but those are like,... we know of two of those ever

@BESW or themselves

Derpy

is that spirit a nine tailed fox?

trogdor

no, because nine tailed foxes have a brain of their own

XD

a big one at that

and also they don't have to steal a body either

BESW

If it's not dumb... good luck. The best you can hope for is probably a few months to years of wish-fulfillment at the expense of everyone around you before the demon takes over completely and your body is the puppet of a psychopathic hedonist and then you die of cancer.

Derpy

12:15

This reminds me of Dragonage and the Fade

trogdor

mm

I didn't play past the first part of Dragonage because the Templars seemed like they were just huge #%&#$'s and the game wasn't apparently aware of that

and they were supposedly the "good guys"

Derpy

The Templar VS Mages thing in Dragonage is indeed a mess.

trogdor

12:31

well,.. it's like,... "we will oppress you now, also you are the bad guy, so suck it up, stupid mage"

to be fair, I did try to play a mage first,... but upon picking my class I shouldn't have to run the risk of being persecuted, victim blamed and gas lit should I?

it's just a game but jeez

and because that was the class I felt like playing, but I didn't feel like putting up with that for,... however long it would take to play the game,... I just dropped it like a hot potato

if there was some indication that the people who made the game realized how actually horribly the Templar were treating mages for no immediately determinable reason,.... then maybe it would have been less of a turn off

oh and the blood mage they were using to apparently justify it was,... cartoonishly evil

he actually didn't even seem to have a coherent character

it was a weird experience for me

in all honesty, if I had continued playing past the first part of the game I probably would have gone full blood mage just to really cheese off every Templar

Derpy

@trogdor that actually does become a little more evident. After the intro.

trogdor

ah fair enough

Derpy

I suppose that they were trying to give the idea that in the game world the treatment mages get is considered NORMAL

trogdor

I would have loved to see any of that indicated from the start

@Derpy ah

Derpy

@trogdor ^ see above. I assume they were indeed trying to build up the dissonance

trogdor

12:41

@Derpy I think they did too good a job of that on my account then

Derpy

it is the same with the whole concept of the "Tranquil"

trogdor

my brother really liked Dragon Age

to be fair though he was like, a dwarf fighter or something

Derpy

@trogdor I can understand how you felt. It must be very similar to how the FF7 "plot twist" worked on me

trogdor

@Derpy which one do you mean?

I feel like it had a couple different strange plot twists

Derpy

@trogdor The "oh, so you liked playing as Zack and you liked Aerith? Well, know what? Forget your player agency... you were playing a different character for about half of the game! Now enjoy playing the rest of the story knowing that all your apparent choices mattered NOTHING"

trogdor

12:44

ah

so a bit of a combo of a couple different ones then

I did actually like the section you play as Zack

I feel like they wanted you to be happy about Cloud again,... but the execution was a little off

Derpy

I wouldn't say so. In the end the whole "Cloud personality was swapped" plot twist is all about that.

Aerith is confirmed to be the original girlfriend the real Zack mentions in a game cutscene.

trogdor

@Derpy I know some people liked that, but my brother and I felt, at the time, like that was a bit of a cop out

Derpy

so, even if you did "choose" Aerith instead of Tifa, the game basically goes like "you know, even that part was just Zack personality"

trogdor

@Derpy that's like the carnival thing right?

Derpy

for example, yep.

trogdor

12:49

it's been a long time

I only played it the once

the thing I remember the most vividly to this day is how much I hated Yuffie Kisaragi

or however her name goes

I don't like my stuff getting stolen

and it seemed like she did that several times

also how long some of those boss fights were

Derpy

she stoles your materia just one time, and at least she gets the free story bonus of "if you do the quest you get them back and discover my tragic background too"

trogdor

you sure she doesn't do that more than once?

Derpy

That said, she also wins the Nami award: "If you have a problem, please ask me for help before running away alone"

trogdor

I can understand that

though I can sorta sympathize with the idea that she might have figured you didn't know her well enough to help

especially with the whole "you stole my stuff at least one time" thing

anyway, is time for sleepingses

Derpy

13:12

@trogdor Have fun at the sleepover party in R'lyeh

KorvinStarmast

13:30

I like this question, but think it might be too broad. Opinions?

NautArch

@KorvinStarmast erik's answer seems to cover it, no?

KorvinStarmast

@NautArch I think so, but as an example of a "homebrew" or "balance" question I don't think it meets the constraints we have in the meta. Or maybe I'm being a bit too harsh this morning.

NautArch

@KorvinStarmast Hmm, possibly - but they aren't providing a specific homebrew balance but a general question about class list spellcasting options which does have a specific answer in the DMG.

KorvinStarmast

@NautArch OK, that works for me.

NautArch

@KorvinStarmast and that's coming from a guy who is generally pretty harsh :)

NautArch

14:07

@DavidCoffron On this question, I'm not sure we can answer how something is supposed to work. It very much reads like "how does this work, how does it interact with other abilities" And we don't really know that because it's homebrew and written by someone else (maybe.) I guess we could read it exactly as-is, but that's potentially making a lot of assumptions.

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch Also, there are definitely multiple questions there including one that is idea generation the possible idea generation question of "how can I make this work?"

NautArch

@Rubiksmoose It's a mix of too broad, unclear, and potentially opinion-based.

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch Yup there are a myriad of issues with it. In no way "can we answer it in its current form" from my reading.

Luke Sommers

Sup dudes

Rubiksmoose

Not much. You?

NautArch

14:15

howdy howdy @LukeSommers

Luke Sommers

Went to a reopening of a store that a lot of people go to here, I have a fear of crowds, so... yeah. Also saw this really cool and chill guy, turns out that's our mayor.

NautArch

@LukeSommers game store?

Luke Sommers

@NautArch Kroger's, grocery.

NautArch

@LukeSommers ah, would have been much cooler if the mayor was a gamer :)

Luke Sommers

@NautArch True, he might be. I don't know. He has earrings, which I think he took out for the election.

Rubiksmoose

14:19

@LukeSommers Good ol' Kroger.

Hopefully you are coming down out of your harrowing crowd experience though!

Tiggerous

@NautArch I'm about to throw up that meta post about UA materials. I'd value any suggestions / edits you think it needs to improve the framing of the question.

Luke Sommers

@Rubiksmoose Thanks! It's mostly just when I'm in them.

NautArch

@Tiggerous yay! I'll take a look when it's up (but have a meeting in 10 minutes)

Tiggerous

OK - bad timing by me :P

David Coffron

@NautArch if it just asked, do these features stack the way it's written the answer is no because you are still casting Eldritch blast (assuming the Pact of the Arc that I found in the document that also has the same Invocation is the right one)

But right now the question is by far not answerable

NautArch

14:27

@DavidCoffron But we are assuming that is what the author meant, and that may or may not be true. Maybe there's a typo, maybe they weren't clear.

David Coffron

@NautArch if the question is asking what the author meant then it's off topic as designer intent

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch oh man I caught that "how can I make this work" was a thinly veiled attempt at idea generation/conversation but it seems that is is the actual intent given that the original wording was "Thoughts and opinions please."

Luke Sommers

If Dis- means not, does that mean Creet means obvious?

David Coffron

We should answer the homebrew as if it was officially released (and maybe just include a caveat that homebrew are often worded slightly differently and include some similar features to show the differences if possible)

NautArch

@DavidCoffron BUt interactions with other abilities is something only the author can tell us, no?

Rubiksmoose

14:34

@LukeSommers Have you ever watched Young Justice per chance?

David Coffron

@NautArch not necessarily. In this case the author outlined some specific cases (Like how it interacts with agonizing blast)

But beyond that there's nothing

Luke Sommers

@Rubiksmoose Whelmed?

David Coffron

(The author would have to release an 'errata' for it to interact differently with other features)

Rubiksmoose

But also many features of written materials don't state how it interacts with other written material explicitly right? That is a lot of what we answer here is "how does feature X interact with feature Y"

@LukeSommers Exactly. The question just reminded me a lot of a Dick Grayson comment. :)

David Coffron

@Rubiksmoose which is why I usually treat homebrew questions like this as "if this were official, how would it work"

Since that's how it's treated in games

Luke Sommers

14:37

@Rubiksmoose True. I don't know why I thought of it.

David Coffron

(And then just mention at the end why an official release would be worded differently or how it would be worded if the abilities did stack)

Rubiksmoose

@LukeSommers They also do aster (dis-aster) a lot in the show lol

Luke Sommers

@Rubiksmoose Yeah

Rubiksmoose

@DavidCoffron I think that is really probably the most straight-forward way with dealing with it. Of course the problem then becomes that homebrew is often poorly written in ways that official marterial isn't. This makes it hard to parse since sometimes it is so different it is like using a different rules language.

@LukeSommers But to answer your question: not in modern English anyways lol. Maybe in the original latin.

Luke Sommers

@Rubiksmoose Start a petition!

David Coffron

14:55

@Rubiksmoose true. In those situations I usually say that it's unclear and then do my best. (Again showing how it "should" be worded both to work as it does and to work as the alternative based on similar official cases if possible)

But this one isn't too bad. Apart from the "through" the weapon part

Which would normally be "with" the weapon

Or "using"

NautArch

@DavidCoffron Hmm, I generally look at them as "I did not consider balance, so any interactions will have to be decided as they come up"

David Coffron

@NautArch I mean in my homebrew i do consider balance, so I don't think it's fair to count them out. If he asks "would it be balanced to allow..." then we can sort about that

And we can always mention whether it would be balanced as an aside in homebrew questions

The Oracle

15:18

3

Q: How should balance questions about DND 5e UA material be best approached?

Wizards use their Unearthed Arcana blog to disseminate new 5e material for playtesting before publication. Material published there is either adapted for publishing, revised and reissued for further playtesting or quietly forgotten. People occasionally ask questions on the main site related to u...

discussion questions homebrew dnd-5e

nitsua60

I know a little man both ept and ert.
An intro-? extro-? No, he's just a vert.
Sheveled and couth and kempt, pecunious, ane,
His image trudes upon the ceptive brain.

When life turns sipid and the mind is traught,
The spirit soars as I would sist it ought.
Chalantly then, like any gainly goof,
My digent self is sertive, choate, loof.

The Oxford Book of American Light Verse
David McCord (1897-)

NautArch

@DavidCoffron I dunno, and maybe this is more of a meta question. But my feeling is there is so much unknown in a homebrew (especially if you didn't make it), that asking about it here isn't really the right place. But I can take that viewpoint and just avoid those questions :)

Luke Sommers

@nitsua60 That's great man

Rubiksmoose

@nitsua60 That is seriously amazing! I love this and I've never seen it before. I love wordplay like this.

Sdjz

@nitsua60 I am having trouble understanding this. Can someone explain?

David Coffron

15:25

@NautArch I don't see homebrew as an unknown. We work with whatever info we have (just like with official content that also has plenty of questions as to how it works with other features). But like you said that's just me

NautArch

@DavidCoffron I think we'll agree to disagree on this one :)

Rubiksmoose

@Sdjz Most of the words here are playing with removing the prefixes of words. So, Disheveled becomes Sheveled, Uncouth becomes couth.

Sdjz

@Rubiksmoose Oh thanks. That makes a lot more sense now, still very hard to read

Rubiksmoose

@Sdjz Yeah fwiw as a fairly well-read native speaker I still don't actually know what some of the words referenced are/mean.

Mike Q

@NautArch Those types of questions can be answerable. Usually when someone asks "Would this [homebrew thing] be balanced", they're implicitly asking if it's balanced relative to other options in the system.

Rubiksmoose

15:31

@MikeQ But that implicit aspect can be seen as troublesome.

NautArch

@MikeQ Homebrew balance questions I'm more okay with (as long as it's their own homebrew) and they go through the guidelines in Meta.

David Coffron

@NautArch you mean as long as they aren't dandwiki :P

NautArch

But when you link to something else with no context and potentially unknown interaction information, then the only person that can answer how things interact is really the author.

David Coffron

@NautArch I don't understand that. Some people release their homebrew with everything spelled out . We csn certainly treat as if its official in that case no?

As long as they aren't asking for intent but a raw (with homebrew) reading: likely source for the homebrew in question

Mike Q

Oh I see, yall are referring to questions that ask about someone else's homebrew

Rubiksmoose

15:37

@NautArch A well-written homebrew (of a quality in wording and usage seen in published material) should be answerable just as published material is even without explicit mention of how things interact or designer commentary. The issue comes when the homebrew material is poorly written and/or deviates significantly from the established rules language.

NautArch

@MikeQ yes, that's more of what i'm referencing. IF someone has their own, than we can ask for clarification and for them to answer. But if it's a 3rd party, we can not say how it will interact because there could be something there we don't know about. Assuming it's their or not there on purpose is not something I'm willing to do.

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch We have the same issue with intent in official stuff. Just saying. You can answer a question on rules interaction without knowing intent.

NautArch

@Rubiksmoose We do, but with official content we can assume that it follows the general rules. We can't make that assumption with homebrew.

David Coffron

@NautArch I think we can. Unless told otherwise the default assumption should be that it does in my opinion, but that's where we disagree which is fine.

Rubiksmoose

@DavidCoffron I'm with you on this.

nitsua60

15:41

@Sdjz And even more pointedly, they're words that have a "false prefix." That is, it looks like a prefix attached to a free-standing word, but the stem with prefix removed is nonsensical. Compare "review" with "respect," for instance.

NautArch

@DavidCoffron @Rubiksmoose Okay, you guys can make that assumption - I can't.

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch I'm just saying that I can look at someones hombrew and analyze it as if it were RAW and its interactions without having to make any asumptions if well-written.

Mike Q

@nitsua60 I thought respect is re (again) + spect (look at)

nitsua60

You use the word "spect" by itself?

Mike Q

I mean, I could, if I really wanted to

David Coffron

15:44

Ugh. [CR calculations ](rpg.stackexchange.com/q/128670/41726) are a drag in 5e

nitsua60

I get that's what it means as a stem (respect, inspect, circumspect, spectacle...), but it's not a word.

Mike Q

If you spect at someone twice, then you will like them better

Hence, respect

Similarly, if a wheel spins halfway, that's 1 "volution"

nitsua60

And a billion microphones make a megaphone.

Rubiksmoose

I'm suspecting tomfoolery here lol

@MikeQ If you spect people too much though you get called creepy and stalkerish though. So be careful.

Sir Cinnamon

Rubiksmoose

15:49

I think this question should be closed as unclear. If the last comment is the actual issue it should be edited into the OP.

And also, if that is the concern, it has nothing to do with allowing the upcasting effect. So it is very unclear what the issue they are asking us to evaluate is.

GreySage

I really dislike how DnD seems to have a fear of making spells easy to learn. Like, they have 1 list telling you who gets what spells, and another list telling you what the spells do, but unless you have the DnDBeyond version up on 2 monitors (or a bootleg pdf), you'll never know by looking at a spell description who can actually use it, which is a big barrier to learning the system (for me at least).

Rubiksmoose

@GreySage It is true that it would have been much nicer if they had indicated what classes get each spell in the description (like on dndb), but how does that affect learning out of curiousity?

GreySage

@Rubiksmoose because I can read the entry for Hunger of Hadar for example, and have no idea which class gets access to the spell. Especially if I am working out of a physical book, I'd have to keep flipping back and forth.

Rubiksmoose

16:04

@GreySage ah yeah I see. You mean you are essentially trying to read through a class' entire spell list. And yeah that is very difficult in the book.

Colin Gross

One big spell list and classes subset it. If you did descriptions by class, you'd have duplicates.

David Coffron

@GreySage yeah even I find that frustrating sometimes (while I have the spell lists mostly memorized I like to double check so I don't mess up)

Colin Gross

Working from the printed material requires some bookmarks to make it efficient on the fly.

Rubiksmoose

@ColinGross So many bookmarks.

Colin Gross

@Rubiksmoose Just like it was for 2nd edition

GreySage

16:08

@ColinGross Yeah, although that would still be really helpful. I'd like them to include a line like "Invisibility, 2nd-level illusion, Wizard, Sorcerer, Warlock"

Colin Gross

post its and sticky tabs everywhere!

David Coffron

@ColinGross but you could just have a section on the bottom that says like what classes can learn it (i.e. Spell lists: hunger of hadar appears on the Warlock spell list)

Colin Gross

@GreySage I think that requires having a comprehensive knowledge of what classes can get the spells and how. I know that subsequent material adds spells to class lists with archetypes of various flavors.

David Coffron

@ColinGross but not to the core spell lists. You don't have to include subclasses

Colin Gross

True.

GreySage

16:10

@ColinGross They already have spell lists by class

Rubiksmoose

@ColinGross DnDBeyond does it just fine. Even with subclasses.

GreySage

I just want that information on the spell

Colin Gross

That would mean those annotations aren't set in stone.

@GreySage The effect of the spell or who gets it and how they get it?

GreySage

So when an archetype says "gain a spell from the Wizard class list" I can know at a glace that Invisibility is an option

Colin Gross

If I'm looking up the effect of a spell, I got to the spell description. There isn't a good reverse lookup, because that's not set in stone.

Rubiksmoose

16:11

@GreySage Well I mean you can do that already with the spells by class list yes?

GreySage

@ColinGross Who gets it by default (no archetypes or weird stuff, just spells normally learnable)

nitsua60

Okay, @Rubiksmoose, @ColinGross, and the room at large: where are your 5e PHB (physical) bookmarks, currently? Interested to see where others have marked "need to get here a bunch."

GreySage

@nitsua60 Freaking spell lists for one

nitsua60

p200, you mean? =)

Colin Gross

@nitsua60 equipment. class spells lists. the spells descriptions of my players most commonly used spells

GreySage

16:12

@nitsua60 207 in my book

Colin Gross

I too have run into the reverse lookup of who gets what spells, but never on the fly.. usually while doing prep work.

Or answering Q's here.

Rubiksmoose

@nitsua60 Because we do character creation decently often and because of class feature confusions I have all the races and classes marked off, the beginning of the spells section, equipment, and the section on combat.

GreySage

Maybe my desire wouldn't actually speed up gameplay, but I feel like it would speed up prep work, and since most of what I do for the game is prep work...

Colin Gross

@GreySage Yes. It would speed that up currently.

Although I do like the clean design of having spell descriptions divorced from their index.

GreySage

@ColinGross I like that idea for online or tech products which can have links back to their index, not for books

Colin Gross

16:17

@GreySage For books the reverse lookup for encyclopedia and other data sources was provided by periodically updated indexes and cross reference tables... the bad old days.

I know at least two DMs that had their own set of those for 2nd edition, and photocopies of Dragon or Dungeon material

GreySage

@ColinGross Indeed. I just suppose that since the core spell lists are pretty much static, you could safely include that information without risk of having to reprint anything.

Rubiksmoose

Speaking of index though, I really wish the PHB index wasn't awful. Is it really that hard to just list the page number instead of redirecting me to a ridiculous umbrella term for the thing I want?

Colin Gross

True. The reverse index could easily cover the core classes.

@Rubiksmoose I concur

I think for providing a convenience to the reader with a bit more context to the spell it makes sense. On the other hand, it's added text that does not functionally impact the spell. It's an rev-index of who happens to get the spell in most cases.

Just looking at my PHB... they could have done this with colored dots. It's not like WoTC doesn't have a lot of experience printing colored circles.

Rubiksmoose

Oh man new flag dialog box format/text.

David Coffron

@nitsua60 conditions (for player reference, I know them), spells for my monsters that I don't have memorized, and actions in combat (Again for player reference)

But when I run physical games I usually bring 4 or 5 players handbooks for my players (and use the digital copy on my pc for myself

Colin Gross

16:30

@DavidCoffron The spells for monsters are given in the stat block. You just have to flip to the description.

I'm thinking about asking my players to make cards for each of their most commonly used spells/actions.

David Coffron

@ColinGross that's what i meant. The descriptions

Colin Gross

@DavidCoffron That's usually what I have to look up as well. I rarely care what class gets them while the game is running, but @GreySage's point is that it would make it easier while just reading and prepping.

Rubiksmoose

@ColinGross David was answering Nitua's question about what we usually bookmark. Not really related to the spell discussion

GreySage

16:48

@ColinGross I usually end up typing up descriptions (either personalized or copy-pasted) for my spells/abilities and print them out when I'm a player. When I played a cleric I had a huge stack of spell descriptions, ordered by level.

Colin Gross

@GreySage Like a little personalized spell book?

David Coffron

@GreySage I play clerics so much I have every one of their spells memorized. It's the druids I need help with lol

GreySage

17:09

Is there a question about if Fireball can break through (and damage things on the other side of) doors (in 5e)?

Sir Cinnamon

12

Q: Does a fireball ignore total cover?

Related: What exact dimensions does a physical cone AoE template need to have? From PHB, p.204; A spell’s effect expands in straight lines from the point of origin. If no unblocked straight line extends from the point of origin to a location within the area of effect, that location isn’t inc...

dnd-5e spells area-of-effect

Thats related but not the entirety

Oh here

7

Q: Is a spell's area set before damage is applied?

Triggered by the question about a fireball in a box, I was curious as to what the specific order of operations is with respect to spell resolution. I have been unable to find any information which states that a spell's area of effect is limited to it's initial casting point. Example scenarios: ...

dnd-5e spells cover

David Coffron

@GreySage does the door have a space where the fire can "go around corners"?

GreySage

@SirCinnamon Dang, I posted a vicious comment on an answer to this Q. The answer kind of deserved it, but no way I would post that nowadays...

Sir Cinnamon

@GreySage It's blunt but you arent wrong

Rubiksmoose

@GreySage I noticed that. lol

GreySage

17:16

I suppose regret means I have grown as a person since then

Rubiksmoose

17:31

@GreySage Or, per a previous discussion‌, that you have simply gretted more than once.

GreySage

@Rubiksmoose So if regret means you wish you could do something differently, gret means... you do do something differently?

Perhaps gret means to change your mind, so regret is changing your mind in the past (or changing it again)?

Rubiksmoose

@GreySage I think the world will never know the answer to this question./

GreySage

@Rubiksmoose The world may gret several times before settling on a definition

Mike Q

@GreySage It is a highly puted topic, the center of much troversy

nitsua60

17:48

@Rubiksmoose @ColinGross I've got one at cleric domains (the channel divinity options I often have to look up), I've got a copy of SCAG's sun soul page stuck into the monk section, the 2e wild surge table (100 entries) tucked into the sorcerer section, the weapon table, the spell list, and conditions.

@ColinGross I make personalize spellbooks for any of my primary casters. They specify the particular gesture and word(s) and have room on each spell's page for notes on interesting uses I made of it. (It's one of the things I find fun about playing a caster, personally.)

Colin Gross

@nitsua60 Useful set of bookmarks. I have conditions on my gm screen.

nitsua60

Yeah, no screen here.

Interesting that they seem to overlap quite a bit. We all basically have equipment, spell list, conditions.

Colin Gross

@nitsua60 That's clever. I like the notes of interesting uses. Like "one time levitated a drake to stop it from flying"

GreySage

@nitsua60 Big lists of stuff with lots of details, and they come up a lot. Makes sense

Rubiksmoose

19:05

@DavidCoffron you might want to look at this Q&A wrt large size rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/84010/…

Comes to different conclusion than the one you posted and addresses it more directly.

NautArch

@Rubiksmoose sort of a mechanically large vs measurably large thing?

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch Yeah I'm not sure how I'd actually rule in this situation honestly. Being large can have lots of advantages but could also come with disadvantages and could be a lot of fun. The rules don't seem to indicate either way.

NautArch

@Rubiksmoose They do give some guidance, though. In that things like the Goliath are 'technically' large, but not functionally large.

Height/weight does'nt really seem to have a mechanic, only area controlled does.

As long as you actually don't control more than a 5' space, then be as tall/heavy as you want?

Rubiksmoose

To be clear I am talking about this question at heart.

(just in case you didn't catch that_

But yeah I would never have an issue with a character becoming taller, but the mechanically large I don't think I would allow generally speaking.

NautArch

19:21

@Rubiksmoose yeah, figured that one out :) Agreed, but it does open up the player argument of "I'm 10' tall, why don't i take up that many spaces on the battlemap?"

GreySage

Bob here is 30ft tall and 20ft wide. And Medium

NautArch

@GreySage exactly. It's weird.

GreySage

Really at this point you're beyond what the rules were meant for, so screw the rules and make something up.

NautArch

@GreySage t-rex arms.

Rubiksmoose

Yeah if there is something that the PC is really working towards and it doesn't create imbalance or trample on other toes, I'll find a way to make it happen generally.

Arg. Did I jump the gun on duping this?

I did. Fixing it.

NautArch

19:29

@Rubiksmoose but maybe not the other way around?

Sir Cinnamon

I would love to wild magic myself into a 2-dimensional creature

David Coffron

@Rubiksmoose the other answer says the opposite though. I don't think it changes your size unless it says so

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch OP is editing this question to focus only on getting smaller which would mean they do not overlap.

NautArch

@Rubiksmoose oh, that's a pretty big change...

Sir Cinnamon

@NautArch Well the enlarge part is a dupe - if OP is happy splitting their question then that works

Rubiksmoose

19:31

@DavidCoffron Yeah I wasn't advocating for either position, just that the Q&A was a better one to reference for your point.

NautArch

@SirCinnamon yeah, but we could have had an answer for both in one spot.

Sir Cinnamon

@NautArch True - But i think the questions are distinct enough that you would almost require a fully bisected answer - growth has no upper bound and shrinking does. Of course the enlarge should be a related question

Rubiksmoose

@NautArch I think I would have told them to split it up even if it wasn't a dupe honestly.

@NautArch Regardless the deed is done.

David Coffron

@Rubiksmoose fixed my comment

Sir Cinnamon

what does the wording "A cone’s point of Origin is not included in the cone’s area of effect, unless you decide otherwise." mean

David Coffron

19:45

@SirCinnamon means the cone doesn't have to hit you

If the point of origin is your hand, you can have it affect you or not

Sir Cinnamon

But if you were to fire from the "back" of your square, across your own square, it would hit you

correct?

that line is a sort of reassurance that when you fire breath you arent sticking your head into the AoE is all?

David Coffron

@SirCinnamon yes. I suppose. The point of origin isn't affected but the rest of the square is (if it's in the AOE)

Sir Cinnamon

Cylinder and sphere have the inverse wording as expected

David Coffron

@SirCinnamon pretty much.

Sir Cinnamon

@DavidCoffron That was my thinking as well - "point" is hard to define in terms of dnd

David Coffron

19:47

Well point of origin is define IIRC

Sir Cinnamon

right but how large is a "point of origin"

one atom or one 5ft square?

evidently somewhere between

David Coffron

Um. It's a point... so it doesn't have a distance

GreySage

@SirCinnamon Its as big as the thing creating the point it

If your hand is making the point, than the point is the size of your hand

David Coffron

It's just the source point

Sir Cinnamon

@GreySage This is probably the rationale i would apply

David Coffron

19:51

What GreySage said essentially

Sir Cinnamon

@DavidCoffron Then it being in the effect or not in the effect is inconsequential - because it's just a point

David Coffron

@SirCinnamon it's still consequential. The point is on your hand so your hand (and therefore you) are affected

Unless it's a cone then you chose

Sir Cinnamon

@DavidCoffron because your hand is one atom within the AoE? It just seems... odd to talk about 3d space that way

with cubes it makes sense - because you place the origin either on the inside face or outside face of the cube - but cones and lines always fire away from the origin

David Coffron

@SirCinnamon there are no atoms in 5e. The AOE extends from the point. It clarifies if the point is included or not

Luke Sommers

@Rubiksmoose Insipid is without flavor

Rubiksmoose

19:57

@LukeSommers Yup I knew that one.

Luke Sommers

@Rubiksmoose I didn't know and had to use google

Sir Cinnamon

@DavidCoffron Even so, 1 point being in the AoE doesnt mean that that a person occupying that point is hit either, iirc

although thisis interesting: "Typically, a point of Origin is a point in space, but some Spells have an area whose Origin is a creature or an object."

if the origin of a cone is a creature, the whole creature can be totally immune from the spell?

Luke Sommers

One of my favorite flaws is "I misuse big words to make myself sound smarter." I forgot what it was, but a player I was playing with used "Photosynthesis" wrong at one point

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